College basketball beat: FSU women stun No. 3 Texas A&M

College basketball beat

January 6, 2009

Trailing by 17 in the second half at home against the No. 3 team in the country, Florida State Coach Sue Semrau issued a challenge -- and her Seminoles responded, rallying to hand Texas A&M its first loss of the season, 60-53.

"The only thing I said to them during timeouts when we were playing so poorly was, 'Do you want to just throw in the towel?' " Semrau said. "I think my sarcasm (ticked) them off a little bit. They had to dig deep in order to do it."

After FSU had trailed 43-26, Tanae Davis-Cain and Courtney Ward led a 16-0 spurt to erase a 50-40 deficit. FSU closed on a 20-3 run.

Blake Griffin had 20 points and 16 rebounds to lead host No. 6 Oklahoma to a 100-64 win over Maryland Eastern Shore without Coach Jeff Capel, who was hospitalized earlier in the day with stomach flu. . . . Dwayne Collins scored 24 points as host Miami (11-3) closed its nonconference schedule with an 85-69 win over Florida Atlantic.

No. 8 Texas women fall

Brittany Rayburn scored 19 points to lead the host Purdue women to a 66-55 win over No. 8 Texas.